Anti-Azerbaijan resolution fails to get French government's support

The French Foreign Ministry has said that two resolutions adopted by the Senate and the National Assembly concerning Armenia and Azerbaijan do not represent the official government position.

"This parliamentary initiative does not represent an official government position; it was adopted independently, in keeping with the separation of powers doctrine," the ministry said, according to Caliber.Az.

"The French government’s position is well known and the Minister has expressed it repeatedly, most recently on November 29: France continues to urge the parties to move forward in these negotiations to seize this opportunity for peace," it added.

"It was in this spirit that President Macron met with the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents in Prague. That meeting resulted in the deployment of an EU observer mission to Armenia," the Foreign Ministry said.

Anti-Azerbaijan resolutions

To recap, the French National Assembly adopted an anti-Azerbaijani resolution on November 30.

All 256 deputies of the lower house of the French Parliament voted for the resolution.

On November 15, the Senate, the upper house of the French parliament, also adopted a resolution calling for the imposition of sanctions against Azerbaijan.

The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry strongly rejected the latest resolution as yet another provocation of France against Azerbaijan.

The ministry said that the false and slanderous anti-Azerbaijan adopted by the French National Assembly (parliament’s lower chamber) demonstrates the country’s biased political stance.

The ministry described the resolution as another provocation by France against Azerbaijan, similar to the recent resolution adopted in the Senate.

“This resolution, being contrary to the norms and principles of international law, once again clearly demonstrates France’s biased political position, accordingly its inability to act as an impartial and fair mediator,” the statement reads.

It emphasised that the mentioned resolution aims at undermining the Azerbaijan-Armenia normalization process, as well as efforts to establish peace and tranquillity in the region.

“In particular, the fact that the representative of the French government actually supported this resolution in the hearings once again shows that the French government, which has recently openly initiated anti-Azerbaijani initiatives on various platforms, stands behind this resolution,” the ministry added.

It recalled that France has not evaluated Armenia's aggression and occupation policies and has not attempted to end the conflict for almost 25 years, using its mediator duty as an excuse. France's prejudice is evident in its open smear campaign and charges made against Azerbaijan after the nation terminated the occupation and settled the conflict on its own.

“We strongly reject this resolution, similar to other provocative steps undertaken by France, including the resolution previously adopted by the Senate,” the ministry stressed.

France cannot be part of peace process

On November 25, President Ilham Aliyev labelled the earlier resolution as "absolutely unacceptable and insulting".

"Now there will be another resolution of the National Assembly of France of the same anti-Azerbaijani origin. And then there was an attempt by France to attack us through the Francophonie summit, which is absolutely unacceptable because Francophonie is a humanitarian organisation. It never dealt with issues like that," Aliyev said.

“So taking all that into account, it is clear that under these circumstances and with this attitude France cannot be a part of the peace process between Azerbaijan and Armenia. And it wasn’t us who cut them from this format. It was them, because neither Russia nor the United States, other former Minsk Group co-chairs, never took, officially I mean, sides in the post-war period – only France,” the head of state mentioned.

“So that means that the meeting in Brussels on 7 December will not take place. We will see what alternatives we have, who will be a kind of a mediator or facilitator, or where the platform will be. I also consider this decision of the Armenian Prime Minister – because they could have imagined that we will be against it – as an attempt to undermine the peace process,” he said.